Hohenstein!!!

Drumroll please.....

HOHENSTEIN ERNSTHAL!!!!!

I am moving to the completely opposite side of the mission! Sister Barlow (my next companion) and I will be opening a sisters program there.  Oh my goodness. I am so excited to go tomorrow. This new area is one of the most beautiful parts of the mission.  A challenge will be is that they speak sechsisch there, which is another version or dialect of German. It is kind of like the Southern language of Germany. The people are also from the GDR or from former Communist Russia when they ruled that part of Germany. So the people have been pretty hardened. It’s going be great. :) I’m pumped.

I have a really busy day ahead of me! I will be waking up bright and early to catch my train in Hamburg then I will pick up my next companion in Berlin and head all the way down to Chemnitz where I will pick up the car. Yes... I will be driving a car this next transfer. I am so excited though. The atmosphere in East Germany is completely different than in the West. I can't wait to tell y'all about it next week!

Funny story from this week! On Tuesday, Sister Garcia and I had an appointment with an investigator. When we got there, she wasn't there, but her niece was. So we ended up teaching her about the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith. When we finished her lesson, another one of our investigators walked in from school. We ended up reading in the Book of Mormon with him until his mom came home (the lady we originally had the appointment with). And then we taught her. Sometimes, the most interesting things happen on a mission. You really learn how to role with it. :) 

I love you all! Have a great week!
 

Sister Reed 

Saying goodbye to Bergedorf's Branch President & his wife.

 

O be wise....

The weeks fly by on a mission. They really do. Tuesday for English course, the Elders drew a map on the board with a theater, hotel, restaurant and all kinds of other things. We sat there in little groups and gave each other directions on how to get from one place to another. We have about 13 students that come to English course now. They are all so enthusiastic about the language. It is awesome!

We are still teaching Phillip, whose real name is Reza.  He is doing really great and is reading in the Book of Mormon. We can’t figure out yet why he isn’t coming to church. We have arraigned a joint teach set up that will be with our Zone leaders and a man from the Stake that is Persian so Reza will have someone to speak his own language with. Our investigator Phillip who is from Africa is also doing well, although he is just a little obsessed with money so we are trying

to work hard to work with him on humility. We are also trying to meet with some Spaniard friends that we met on the street a few weeks ago and that have been a lot of fun. Our sweet friends Elinda and Kevin are both doing well. Kevin couldn’t come to soccer or church this week because he got the flu. :(

We are still trying so hard to work with this branch. If you could please pray for them especially President Imbeck and Bruder (Brother) Winkler in specific, that would be really awesome :)

Sister Garcia and I have been looking for service opportunities to do around our area. But while we are looking, we decided to help a lady in our ward edit her thesis she is a native

Spanish speaker that has been living in Germany and writing a final thesis in English. I am so amazed with the people here.

We started up Fußball (soccer) again. This week we got to play because we didn't have any appointments at the time. We play with a bunch of kids from the ward and they bring some

friends from school, and some less active youth come as well. We play in a field by the church. Fußball is huge here! I am totally going to go home a huge fan. :)

We are reading the Book of Mormon as a mission right now and we read Jacob this week. One of my favorite scriptures in the Book of Mormon is in Jacob. He talks all about what we need to do to achieve salvation and that Heavenly Father is always right there to back us up. At the end he simply states "O be wise; what can I say more?" We all know what we should be doing. We know what is good and what is wrong, what we should be doing and what we shouldn't. I can

testify that when we really take the time to do the small simple things that we should be doing, we will find more joy day to day and we will find ourselves to be significantly less stressed out. :)

Have a lovely week! I love you all. Sister Reed

"Who do you play for?" From the movie 'Miracle'

Sorry that this letter is a little bit short. But, I have some good news! Transfer calls are in about a week and a half and President Kosak told me I will be transferred, so I would wait to send anything until I find out where I will be going.  I’m so excited!

This week has been amazing. I’ve been so lucky to email a friend from my high school about the Atonement.  She has been reading my letters while I am on my mission and in one of my emails I invited anyone who wanted to know more about the Atonement to ask me and she did!! Sister Garcia and I are also still teaching English classes up at the Church and we just started Saturday soccer again! Ya!!!  We are really trying to get weekly Young Women’s program on Wednesday nights started as well, and for fun we decorated the Young Women’s room with hearts for Valentines celebration!

And one of our investigators came to church this week and he was ready and everything as soon as we got there! WOOT!   

 
Last week we were able to make a trip to concentration camp with the youth and members of the Ward.  It was hard to see and it was interesting to talk with the members about it too.  In the museum, they had a drone voice recording that was reading all of the names of the people that were killed in that specific camp. It was hard, but I learned a lot about the Plan of Salvation and of the Atonement. President Kosak also showed us a video about Auschwitz this week as well and it was tough to see.
 
Last Wednesday I played violin for our Zone Training meeting. I played a combination of ‘I Know That My Redeemer Lives’, ‘Nearer My God to Thee’, and ‘Lead Kindly Light’.  I made it all up!  It went really well though, so President Kosak and Sister Kosak were able to hear me play as well as everyone in the Zone. I am now going down in the Berlin Mission as the sister that plays violin really well. My companion Sister Garcia is the Spanish speaking sister and together President calls us the "Dream Team"... haha! I love it!

I wanted to share a thought I had this week while reading in the Bible about David and Goliath. While I was reading this story in the scriptures; the movie ‘Miracle’ about the 1981 Gold Medal Olympic Hockey Team popped into my head. The coach in this movie constantly asks the players "Who do you play for?" eventually one of the teammates yells "THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA!" I was thinking about what team do I play for? Who do we play for?

I am grateful to have the opportunity to serve the people here in Germany.

Never forget what is really important to you :) And never forget to have fun!

Sister Reed

*Here is a picture of the concentration camp that we visited.....

Missed the bahn (Train)

This week we had alot of 'suprise' appointments with people. One of them was with Phillip from Ghana. We were heading to an appointment with him and ended up passing by him on the U-Bahn (underground train). He had completely forgotten about our appointment and was heading up to the main city of Hamburg. We ended up hopping on the train with him and teaching him about the Restoration of the Gospel, Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon. Although the Bahn was very loud and filled with lots of people, we could still feel the spirit and the love that Heavenly Father has for all of his children.

 

This past Sunday, we had an appointment with Persian Phillipp. He was really open and had so many questions about life and what happens when we die. We taught him the Plan of Salvation and talked about our purpose here on Earth. He was so excited because he said that he has had these questions for so long and he now has an answer to them. He said "it all makes sense. It must be true." At the end of our lesson, we gave him a Book of Mormon in Persian. He told me and Sister Garcia that we need to learn Persian. So guess who is learning Persian now?
:D

This week was really great. I can`t wait to see what will happen this next week. This gospel really does bring so much joy. Sister Garcia and I walked down the street asking people what brings them joy. Every time we got a different answer, but a huge grin on everyone’s face. I love sharing this message that has brought me joy and peace to others.

The amount of hope that people get from this truth is amazing.

Although we are human, we really can do amazing things.

 

Have a lovely week!

Sister Reed

(We can do amazing things. But that doesn't mean we will not hit speedbumps along the way. So here is a picture of Sister Garcia and I missing our Bahn or train)

Phillip or Phillipp?

It's super cold, but super cute here!

Moin Moin! 

This week was another week filled of interesting adventures here in Bergedorf. We started the week off with Tausch. I stayed here in Bergedorf with our Sister Training Leader named Sister Terhorst. She is super sweet. We had a very interesting experience though. Tuesday morning, we were going to have an appointment in Mümmelmansberg with an investigator named Phillip, an African man from Ghana. We called him when we got there and he said that he was in a German class and would be able to meet in a few hours. While we were waiting, we decided to go by on another investigator. We ended up teaching her about the plan of salvation and why we are hear on the earth. Phillip never called us back though. So we continued through our day and went back to Bergedorf to have some lunch and do some finding. While we were talking with this man on the street, we got a phone call from an unknown number. When we answered, it was Phillip telling us that he wanted to meet up in Bergedorf. So we walked over to McDonalds to wait. After about 5minutes he called saying that he had arrived. We were looking all over for Phillip. Then a white man walked out on the phone saying "There you are!". This was not African Phillip. When we started talking to him, he also said his name was Phillipp. (with two p's). He said that he had had contact with the church once before. He is a born again Christian and used to be Muslim. We ended up giving him the first lesson and he wants to start coming to our church. We have yet to figure out how the numbers switched in our phones from Phillip to Phillipp... but now we have a new investigator! And we lost contactwith our other investigator. haha! Win lose situation?

Sister Garcia and I are also starting to work with the young woman here...there is only one. But, she is super sweet. :)

I am running out of time, but I hope that you have a lovely week! :) 

"Use the atonement every morning till the end of every day." 

(If you don`t know what the Atonement is, email me and I will tell you. :) )

Sister Reed 

This is Helma - One of our sweet investigators & her puppy

Music to my ears!

This week was amazing! The sun came out for about 2 days! But of course I will start with the Hamburg Philharmonic. Last Monday, Sister Garcia and I had the opportunity to listen to them play. The violinist, Pinchas Zukerman, was a soloist. It was really an amazing experience. Sister Garcia and I felt a little out of place! It felt like we were in a castle. But, the music they played filled my heart.

I got my German driver’s license this week! For now, I will still be riding bikes and walking, but one day I might get sent to an area with a car. The only sad part of it was that they took my old (Texas) driver’s license to get my German one... So I will have to go get another Texas one when I get home. Crazy stuff, (oh... and the German driver’s license don`t look as cool as Texas)

Sister Garcia and I had the opportunity to teach one of our investigators this week. She ended up bringing her boyfriend along so we decided to teach him as well. We ended up teaching them about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon, the plan of salvation and that families can be together forever, and about Temples and why they are so important to us. They are both super sweet, come to church and English course, and started reading in the Book of Mormon. They rock!

Sister Garcia and I went to a city called Mummelmansberg to try to find an old investigator that I used to teach. We haven't had contact with her in a few months and I missed her... so we decided to go by. She was there! We talked to her for a little bit, but she had to go so we made an appointment to meet this week. On our way out, we met a man named Phillip. He lives right next to this other investigator. We started talking to him and invited him to the German class that we teach. The next day we ended up on the same train. We started talking about what we do as missionaries. He has so many questions about life and the Bible. So we also started meeting with him. :)

This week, Sister Garcia and I used our new way of finding. The reactions from people were completely different from before and way more respectful. We started talking to this man about the gospel and missionary work. He lives alone and has no religious background. He was really sweet and got really excited about what we do as missionaries. He had us go to his neighbor’s house and show him what we do. (even though we did it to him about 10 minutes before) haha! He asked if we could meet up again and offered us a smoke, coffee, beer and then finally tea, pretty much everything that we don`t do like drink... or smoke.  He is super kind! I am really excited to meet with him again this week.

To end such an awesome week, our district leader read us a story over the phone the other night in Swiss German. He is from Switzerland (Swiss German kind of sounds like German with a Scottish accent) It was so funny! I didn't understand any of it.

I will leave you all with a quote from the piano guys.

"Don't stay where you are right now in life. Push yourself beyond where you are at right now."

If you do this, you will truly be able to do amazing things! I love you all and I hope that you have a lovely week!

Sister Reed